Lawmakers seek to name clinic after Medal of Honor winner

September 18, 2018

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Members of Louisiana’s congressional delegation are seeking to rename a veteran’s clinic in Lake Charles after a Medal of Honor winner who died in Vietnam.

U.S. Sens. Bill Cassidy and John Kennedy and Rep. Clay Higgins announced their legislation Monday in a news release. They hope to have the Lake Charles Community-Based Outpatient Clinic named after Douglas Fournet.

The Kinder native was a U.S. Army lieutenant. Monday’s announcement says he is the only person from Southwest Louisiana to be awarded the Medal of Honor. The legislation would name the Lake Charles facility the “Douglas Fournet Department of Veterans Affairs Clinic.”

The release says Fournet joined the army in 1966 and died in Vietnam as he tried unsuccessfully to disarm a mine while his platoon was under sniper fire.